


Saikai (Reunion)

by lunarmoonchild (bobaheadshark)



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pokemon, But otherwise Poké-world appropriate, F/M, Implied Cloning and Weapons Testing by Snoke (Background), Teen-appropriate angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:41:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24112240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bobaheadshark/pseuds/lunarmoonchild
Summary: When Rey meets Ben, she is seven, and she’s looking at the clear blue of the sky and the emerald green of the grass for the very first time. They’re both in the field searching for wild Butterfrees, and stumble on the same one.----A Pokémon x Reylo ficlet inspired by art from @semostellar. Rey and Ben meet three times over the years. A short story about companionship, courage, and choosing your own destiny.
Relationships: Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 18
Kudos: 46





	Saikai (Reunion)

**Author's Note:**

> Check out Semo's amazing [art](https://twitter.com/semostellar/status/1258439443893022722), which prompted me to write this. 
> 
> Keyboard-smashed this story in 48 hours, so thanks to [Lepak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lepak) for the speedy beta and Pokénerdism, and [Ondakrosmos](https://twitter.com/ondakrosmosondakrosmos) for the sense-check!
> 
> Minor mention of blood and a cut at this line: "He clutches a shard of moonstone", so you might want to skip that line if that squicks you out. Shouldn't impact the story too much.

* * *

When Rey meets Ben, she is seven, and she’s looking at the clear blue of the sky and the emerald green of the grass for the very first time. They’re both in the field searching for wild Butterfrees, and stumble on the same one. 

“I got it first,” he says.

“It’s not yours to own,” she replies.

He crosses his arms over his explorer’s vest. But his Pokémon, a little brown Eevee, peers out from behind his legs, and steps forward to sniff her Riolu. 

It’s said that a person’s Pokémon is a mirror to the truest version of themselves. And this boy’s clearly not as tough as he tries to appear. 

Rey extends her hand to shake his, like she’s seen the adults do in Niima. Although he’s older, he’s still tall for his age. Rey decides that he can help her climb the trees, to study the Combees. With two people, it’ll be faster, so she might only get two stings, instead of twelve. The more pictures she can take of the Combees, the more she can sell at the Outpost. She will be good, and she will be helpful, like Mr. Plutt wants. It’s her first time outside of her hometown, and she will make it worth Mr. Plutt’s time. She will repay him, and he will finally tell her where her parents went. 

It’s this simple in Rey’s mind, like fractions and decimals. Because her parents will come back. Right?

But that summer day, the boy shakes her hand, and they spend the afternoon running through the fields. They talk about all the creatures in the world they want to know one day. From the tiniest Joltik to the most mountainous Snorlax. 

She learns his name, and that Ben’s Dad is in town to do a trade. And he tells her that his mum is something called a “senator”, which she thinks sounds a lot like a Centiskorch, and Ben laughs at that, because Leia _can_ be dangerous in a fight, especially when Dad comes home from the cantina after too many Firewhiskeys. He tells Rey that it means his mother’s away a lot for work, doing important things. 

It makes Rey wonder if her mum has gone to do something important, too.

They get dirt on their clothes and grass on their knees, and their Eevee and Riolu chase each other through the reeds. It’s sundown before they have to part ways, and he promises to meet her back at the same time tomorrow. 

The next day, she waits there with a Butterfree net for ninety-five minutes, before she realises he won’t show. 

He’s halfway across the star system in the Falcon before he stops screaming at Han for dragging them from Niima with no warning, and ruining it all. 

“Sorry, kid. Deal went south,” is all his father has to say. 

##

Rey is sixteen when she earns her fourth gym badge. She knocks out Poe’s enormous Pidgeotto in Yavin, and word spreads in the Outer Rim of a prodigious new young trainer who doesn’t capture creatures with snares or Pokéballs, but tames instead. As Rey’s name spreads, so do whispers of a man whose face is gnarled as a Trevenant, and his three apprentices in the North. All there is to substantiate the claims are shadowy pictures of a fortress being constructed in Exegol, and rumours of experiments that silence the howls of all creatures who venture there. 

But they’re just rumours, and Rey has Pokémon to track, and places on the map she has yet to go. She thinks sometimes of the boy from her childhood, the one with sunlight in his eyes, and she wonders where he is. Until one day she’s on Kijimi, trying to lure a particularly feisty Dewgong, and he’s _there_. Ben’s robes are different, and he’s grown handsome – even though his ears still remind her of a Bunnelby’s. But there’s so much sadness and fear in his expression that she freezes in her tracks for a second, before she calls out to her Lucario to Quick Guard. 

He isn’t there for her. It seems like he doesn’t even recognise her. But she’d know that Eevee anywhere, and as its eyes glow yellow, she turns to Ben as if to say something – but he ignores her, and tosses a Pokéball at the Dewgong. It’s not a type of Pokéball she’s seen before. The black orb glows bright crimson before it snaps shut with a horrible screeching noise, and the skittish creature she’s spent hours working with is gone. Stolen from her, to a place where custom dictates that she can have no claim. 

“How DARE you,” she says.

“You hadn’t caught it.”

“I’ve been trying to lure that Dewgong for weeks.”

“Then you should have caught it.”

And that’s all it takes. Something in her snaps, and Lucario and Eevee lunge at each other. Claws and fists fly as she glares at him across the frost-covered terrain.

The snow’s picked up, and it buffets her in sheets of cold wind. She thinks that she can read uncertainty in his face when his eyes flick to look at her, but it disappears like foam on the frozen sea. 

There’s a part of her that wants to call out to him. _Do you remember who I am?_ _Where have you been all these years? What’s happened to you?_

He speaks first.

“You need a teacher. I can show you a different way.”

But instead of answering, all she knows is fury. She channels it into the fight: their Pokémon twist and turn and attack as Rey calls out sequence after sequence, and she tries to understand what happened to the boy who loved nature with so much compassion. 

It takes all of Rey’s wit and strategy, but her Lucario finally knocks the Eevee down to the ground, and it’s over. Ben says nothing, and draws the little creature back into the orb on his belt before he flees.

That night, when the rest of the Order is asleep, his hands shake as he remembers. Rey. Her ferocious rage in battle. How he and Han had fought. How he had already gone to Snoke, lured by promises of glory, and never got to say goodbye when his father passed. How the cadets whisper that he still clings to his little prairie pup when the Knights conquer with the brute strength of Latikrais and Machamps. 

So he sits in his quarters with Eevee, and seeps in his icy lake of anger. He looks out into the sky and its cloak of stars. Shame and guilt rile through him, and Eevee nestles into his side as if she can guard him from whatever hurt that comes. She whimpers as he weeps. He clutches a shard of moonstone so tight that blood drips from his hands, and he watches bone and sinew twist beneath skin, as Eevee transforms.

  
##

  
Rey is twenty-one when she enters the final Gym at Exegol to face the Elite Order. Her first opponent is Phasma, whose platinum hair is as spiky as the relentless attacks she favours in her strategy. Phasma’s Hundoom has razor-sharp fangs and her Metagross is a colossus – but Rey just about manages with a well-coordinated Rain Dance from her Lapras, and a finisher Iron Tail from her Steelix. It takes her more time to work out the strategy of the next leader, Hux, who favours smokescreens and slow-barbed poison – but forty minutes later an Air Slash from her Butterfree leaves his Alakazam lying on the carbon floor of the arena. Hux's smile drips with barely concealed venom as he waves her forward to the next room.

She uses the last of her Hyper Potions on her Lucario as she prepares herself for the penultimate battle, which awaits behind huge Durasteel doors. One more fight, and she’ll defeat Snoke, and access the archives that will tell her where her parents are. 

She’s standing in a dark room lit only by torches when she hears his voice. The familiarity of it slithers up her spine, iron laced with silk.

“You. The girl I’ve heard so much about.”

“Save your words, Ben.”

“It’s Kylo, now.”

“None of that. I know exactly who you are.”

“You do? Ah, you do.”

He steps forward, and his creature with him. That’s when she gasps, because it’s an Umbreon – with fur the colour of charcoal, and yellow rings on its body that glow with mysterious power. A creature of nighttime and darkness, and she understands now what Ben has become. 

“You must think I’m a madman, or a fanatic,” he says.

“No. Something far worse has happened to you.” She shakes her head. “You think what you’re doing is right.”

They stand on opposite sides, and there’s nothing more she can say to him. Her Lucario sinks into an opening stance, and Rey’s already calculating the odds. Perhaps he favours fire and dark? It’s hard to call. But there’s little time for her to think, because the Umbreon launches into its first Faint Attack with lethal grace. 

It’s almost a familiar dance from their last meeting years ago. Except that as Ben switches between his Salamence and Froslass and Swellow with breathtaking efficiency, even the healing charm from her Ampharos can’t mitigate the onslaught. There’s fear in her heart as she soon realises she’s losing. 

The prospect of defeat at the hands of _him_ , of being one hall away from the one person who can tell her her destiny and place in all this – pushes her to desperation.

As their creatures slash and twirl, she shouts at him from across the arena.

“You don’t have to do this, Ben. You don’t have to go this way.”

There’s a flash of astonishment in his eyes at his old name, one he’s not heard since his parents pleaded with him not to leave.

“Don’t say that name.”

“Whatever you are – Ben, Kylo. The weapons tests on Florum. Cloning farms on Endor. It isn’t right.” 

All of Snoke’s words bubble in his mind, cloying with their seduction. It makes his head hurt.

“Snoke says that we will fight to claim our rightful place, and we will win,” he says.

“At what cost? We do it arm in arm, not through conquest! Ben, you’re stronger than he is, and he’s using you.”

“Don’t assume you know _anything_ about what I’ve been through.”

“Maybe you’re right. I don’t know.” Rey says, pleading now. “But I know that deep down, there’s still goodness in you. And whatever Snoke promised, it won’t bring Han back. _”_

But that just angers him more, and within minutes, she’s four Pokémon down and knows her Lucario won’t hold out long. Ben’s Umbreon sends a Screech so sharp that Rey covers her ears, and her fighter goes tumbling across the hall.

“I know something too, Rey. I know who your parents are.”

The thing is, she does know. As Lucario’s punches slow, the clarity of Ben’s statement sends a ripple into the deepest recesses of her mind, and she’s forced to confront the magnitude of what she already recognises to be true.

“Say it.” His voice is soft. Not a threat, but a supplication.

Her Lucario’s unsteady on its two legs as the Umbreon stalks. 

“They were nobody.” She whispers.

“They were junk traders. Who sold you for drinking money.”

 _But they’re coming back for me._ She thinks. _They are._ A fable she’s told herself for so many years, so it must be true if she wills it to be.

“You know they’re gone.” 

She does. The starkness of it hurts – she’s alone. 

The anger that’s been at bay for so many years finally unfurls inside of her, and she welcomes it. Suddenly, her Lucario’s shimmering in front of her, and it’s changing again. Growing bigger as Umbreon sends Dark Pulses and Sand Attacks whipping towards it.

“Rey,” For the first time, Ben sounds uncertain. He takes a step back. 

“They didn’t abandon me,” she grits out. Her rage is a river, and it engulfs her as Lucario unleashes a Dragon Pulse so strong that the arena floor shakes. Umbreon dodges the Pulse just in time, and it crouches in an Endure stance and hisses. One by one, the lights in the hall flicker orange and blue, and for the first time she knows that it’s not just the Lucario’s doing, and she’s afraid of her own power. 

Then it’s Ben’s voice, quiet through the storm: “You can’t go back to them. Just like I can’t.”

It’s a dam in the seaswell of her fury. And Rey crumples to the ground, dry-heaving and gasping for air. He’s stepped closer now, and does nothing except hold her. And in the middle of it all, they’re just two people, lost in their grief. 

Her Lucario tumbles to the ground beside her, exhausted. His Umbreon draws near, and nudges Rey’s arm with her nose. The battle is all but forgotten, and there’s a gentle popping noise as the two Pokémon Ben and Rey hadn’t used now soar into the air, as if wordlessly summoned. The Chimeco sends a Healing Wish across the room, which bathes the arena in a lilac wash of light. In perfect symphony, the Drifblim initiates a Destiny Bond that binds the Chimeco to it. Rey intuits, rather than sees, the dozen exhausted Pokémon on both sides restored to full health.

Ben’s read about this phenomena in books, but has never seen it before. 

“A dyad.” He says. 

“Healing power, from two that are one,” she whispers. “I guess there’s a strange sort of symmetry to it. A Chimeco doesn’t come without gentle coaxing. There’s light in you, yet.”

“And darkness in you. Aren’t Drifblims drawn to lost souls?” 

“It’s said that they carry wishes with them in the wind. Poetic, isn’t it?”

She feels his gaze searching her face, and then they watch in awe as the Chimeco and Drifblim draw arcs in the air for an interminable time. 

So Ben makes a choice. He leans closer and whispers to Rey of a place, an island no map has charted. The Unknown Regions, with creatures of the deep and of the sky, and many more to discover. She tells him that he needs no master, nor does he need to master any creature. In that same breath, he understands exactly what he needs to do. How he’s wasted years waging a battle within himself, blind to the implications of the more important war that he’s been on the wrong side of for years. 

“Destroy their cages, and we can leave this place.” She says it with a confidence that’s declarative, but they both know it’s a question. His answer is a simple nod, and it unlocks a soaring feeling in him that he thought he’d forgotten. 

Perhaps the fight ahead will be long and weary. Perhaps even if they win that, Snoke's people will come after them. They both need to reconsider the contours of their lives and the world outside, but maybe that’s something they don’t have to do alone. Not anymore.

So they stand. The Lucario rises with them. Their Chimeco and Drifblim float in the air like lanterns, and the rings on the Umbreon’s fur glow like haloes to lead the way.

They stare at the final set of doors. Then, Ben looks down at her and she sees it: the boy with sunlight in his eyes. But there’s a glimmer of something else there, too. Hope.

It makes her smile.

There’s a thunderous creak as the doors yawn open. She doesn’t know what the future holds, but she embraces the shape of it – solid, and clear.

He reaches out with his hand, and she takes it. The universe awaits.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I know T-rated fics aren't for everyone's cup of tea, so I appreciate the time you took to check out this little corner of the fandom. If you liked it or want to debate Rey and Ben's lineup, please let me know on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/bobaheadshark) or in the comments ;) 
> 
> I am a hardcore Gen I and II Pokémon fan, but otherwise hope you were okay with me taking artistic liberties with this 😂
> 
> There's too many Bulbpedia entries to link, but if you're interested:
> 
> [Drifblim](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Drifblim_\(Pok%C3%A9mon\)#Pok.C3.A9dex_entries_3) has quite an eerie backstory
> 
> [Chimecho](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Chimecho_\(Pok%C3%A9mon\)) is the softest, and screams Ben Solo to me.
> 
> [Lucario](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Lucario_\(Pok%C3%A9mon\))
> 
> [Umbreon](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Umbreon_\(Pok%C3%A9mon\))
> 
> Saikai is a song from the '98 Pokemon soundtrack.
> 
> As for the SW lore, Florum, Endor, Exegol, Niima etc. all from canon.
> 
> Thanks again for reading! Concrit + comments welcome!


End file.
